40 in one week compared to 88 in three months. Divide the 88 by 12, the number of weeks in that 3month period, is 7.3.

So 40 compared to 7.3. How does that look?

That's really not how the maths would be done. It's 40 reactions in that week - did 40 happens every week? It seems not or we'd be hearing about them here I suspect.

Mother of two living in UK. Daughter (2007) born in USA, son (2010) born here. I'm pro natural birth, midwife care, breastfeeding, co-sleeping, baby wearing and a keen advocate of cloth diapering. I'm a full time working research scientist (physical sciences). Vaccines save lives.

Ferney-Voltaire, 10 January 2013—The Meningitis Vaccine Project learned of the story published in the Chadian weeklyLa Voixregarding the MenAfriVac vaccine that was introduced in Gouro in December 2012. On behalf of our global partners, we wish to emphasize that we

take every MenAfriVac-related report very seriously.

An investigation team is on the ground in Chad to explore what caused these statements. All available data point to the high safety and effectiveness of the vaccine. We believe that the investigation in Chad will shed light on the exact circumstances that caused the publication of the article inLa Voix.We will make that information public as the scientific reports become available.

How reassuring that they are taking this report seriously, investigating it properly and plan to publicise the results once they have them. Just what I would hope would happen after reports of what looks like it could be a serious vaccine reaction.

Mother of two living in UK. Daughter (2007) born in USA, son (2010) born here. I'm pro natural birth, midwife care, breastfeeding, co-sleeping, baby wearing and a keen advocate of cloth diapering. I'm a full time working research scientist (physical sciences). Vaccines save lives.

How reassuring that they are taking this report seriously, investigating it properly and plan to publicise the results once they have them. Just what I would hope would happen after reports of what looks like it could be a serious vaccine reaction.

I'd be more reassured if they were investigating what happened to the paralysed kids, instead of what lead to the publication of the article. Hopefully that was just a poor choice of words.

That's really not how the maths would be done. It's 40 reactions in that week - did 40 happens every week? It seems not or we'd be hearing about them here I suspect.

Then what can be compared? The 40 paralyzed in a small region/village in Chad has already been compared to the number of vpd or meningitis deaths for the entire continent of Africa. It has been compared, by you, to the number of deaths in Chad for a three month period. OHHHH! It's acceptable to compare the forty to ANY number of deaths, as long as the number of deaths is greater, and makes the vaccine seem safe!!! Thanks for the info!

How reassuring that they are taking this report seriously, investigating it properly and plan to publicise the results once they have them. Just what I would hope would happen after reports of what looks like it could be a serious vaccine reaction.

Using "region" implies that it happened over a larger, more spread out area. That they were all from one village means the children likely had a lot more in common/a lot more shared exposure to other things beyond having gotten the same vaccine at the same time than if they lived farther apart.

According to a google, the population of Gouro is "very small" according to some sources and "under a thousand" according to others. If it really is under a thousand, and 500 were vaccinated there, then that means somewhere between half the population and the entire population (depending on how much under a thousand it is) was vaccinated at the same time. Most likely pretty much all (if not actually all) the younger people and kids at least got the vaccine. So if it was an unrelated virus or chemical exposure or whatever that was just coincidental to the time of the vaccination, you aren't going to see it happening in unvaxed kids too to reveal that if there are no (or very few) kids who weren't vaccinated.

If it was a problem with the vaccine, that it happened only in this one village and to such a high number of people implies that it most likely isn't a problem inherent in the vaccine but rather that the vaccine was contaminated with something whether by accident or tampering, onsite or at the place of manufacture, or a problem in the administering of the vaccine. I would imagine that one of the things the investigation will check is whether the kids who were paralyzed all got vaccine from a particular lot that wasn't used anywhere else.

But how big are vaccine lots? Since this is supposed to be a cheap vaccine, I would guess (and I could be entirely wrong on this) that they make it in fairly large batches and it seems unlikely that one small village would use up an entire batch. So if it were the vaccine, why would be seeing this only in one small village, at least if it was a problem from manufacture?

More recent online stories are saying up to 50 paralyzed. Not confirmed with the news, though.

Paralysis occurred within 24 hours of the vaccine. If it wasn't the vaccine itself, then it would seem those who brought the vaccine also brought the cause of the problem. Still concerning. How long will the investigation take?

The same article claims that the children have recovered and are leading normal lives again, and that over 100 million people across ten countries in Africa were vaccinated with this vaccine in 2012.

Could it still be a coverup and they are lying that one of the sick kids had not had the vaccine? Sure.

But 100,000,000 doses... If it caused such terrible reactions at a rate of even close to 40 out of 500 in general, it would be impossible to cover up, so why is this one small village being hit so badly?

Quote:

Originally Posted by pek64

More recent online stories are saying up to 50 paralyzed. Not confirmed with the news, though.

Paralysis occurred within 24 hours of the vaccine. If it wasn't the vaccine itself, then it would seem those who brought the vaccine also brought the cause of the problem. Still concerning. How long will the investigation take?

I've seen sites saying that some or many of them started showing symptoms shortly after or 24 hours, but what source is saying paralysis occurred within 24 hours?

It's possible they brought a disease in with them or caused it to spread by not following proper sanitary procedures... or it's possible it was entirely unrelated to the vaccine and the timing is coincidental. I do hope they continue to investigate and are able to determine the exact cause of the illness, but assuming the do find it worth paying for the investigation, sadly it is unlikely we will ever hear the results (unless they find it was the vaccine after all) as Western media is generally not that concerned with the going ons of a remote village in Africa, and Vaxtruth and such is very unlikely to retract their claims or spread the word if a non-vaccine cause is determined.

I knew that would go over like a lead balloon, but I don't see any reason not to believe it. It makes more sense to me than that 36 vaccines out of a lot of thousands randomly (and all in the same village) caused paralysis, including somehow in a child that wasn't vaccinated.

It implies most of the children/young people are fine now and have gone home. Going from what was reported as compete paralysis to fine in less than a month sounds psychological to me....

Also if its true, that an unvaccinated child had the symptoms too would seem very conclusive.

Mother of two living in UK. Daughter (2007) born in USA, son (2010) born here. I'm pro natural birth, midwife care, breastfeeding, co-sleeping, baby wearing and a keen advocate of cloth diapering. I'm a full time working research scientist (physical sciences). Vaccines save lives.

Pek, it's not like being vaccinated here. It's an isolated group of people with little to no regular access to medical are in a climate that is EXTREMELY suspicious of vaccines and the groups that give them. It's a situation ripe for that kind of thing.

Not to mention all the medical tests and examinations came back NORMAL.

According to the statement, one child who never received the meningitis shot ‘complained of suffering from the same symptoms’ found in the other children.” [3]

However, a contact in Chad gave VacTruth an extremely different version of events. He said:

“The government and the World Health Organization have made up these facts.

The government banned journalists from visiting the hospital since the children brought in. (sic) All the children from Gouro received the vaccine.

Firstly, they (Government/WHO) collaborated with the school’s headmaster who locked the school’s main door before vaccinating all the children. The school headmaster told the children that anyone who refused the vaccine would be banned from school and be arrested.

Secondly, they went door to door and injected the babies over one year.”

Me neither. Think it might be a different thing I'm not surprised about from VaxTruthLies.com though....

Mother of two living in UK. Daughter (2007) born in USA, son (2010) born here. I'm pro natural birth, midwife care, breastfeeding, co-sleeping, baby wearing and a keen advocate of cloth diapering. I'm a full time working research scientist (physical sciences). Vaccines save lives.

Me neither. Think it might be a different thing I'm not surprised about from VaxTruthLies.com though....

This is entirely your opinion. You have no way of possibly knowing who is telling the truth. However, the pathetic conclusion that the investigation came to does not make me trust the Chadean goverment one bit.

I commend Christina England in reporting on this story, otherwise it would have never gotten out.